Roland S-50 Install of Gotek Emulator

Synth Repair
1

Having issues with getting a Roland S-50 to boot from a Gotek Floppy Emulator.

After turning on the S-50 with USB inserted, the Oled appears to recognize the boot file, but the syth doesnt appear to boot.

This unit had issues booting with the floppy drive, it would continuously try to boot forever when a floppy was inserted.

There were issues with the display also, there it is blank with no characters displayed.

When the power switch is turned on or off, you do see the display turn on briefly before going dark.

Hooked up to the composite video output to see if anything was happening, but after displaying the boot display screen it just hangs, no boot info.

Any advice would be appreciated.

2

Hey, welcome to the forum!

Sounds like your S-50 is having some other issues that you need to get sorted out first. Have you verified the power supply is outputting the correct voltages? Sounds like you might have a main board or power supply problem if your screen is only briefly turning on.

3

Thanks for the reply! Yes, I agree there are probably multiple issues at work. The display issue wasnt preventing booting, according to the person I bought it from…
I was hoping to just make sure that
I have the Gotek installed properly. I am breaking out the voltmeter to check the power supply today. Found the service manual online
Also, do you know if the CPU LED on the main board should be lit solid all the time?

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Unfortunately I’m not particularly familiar with the S-50 so I’m not sure if that LED should stay lit, maybe someone else can chime in on that.

I have installed Goteks in various synths and samplers and some are more finicky than others. Does your Gotek have HXC or Flashfloppy installed?

Main things to be sure is the ribbon cable to the Gotek is connected properly; the red stripe should go to pin 1. If the Gotek is powering on then you must have the power cable on there correctly. For Roland synths you usually just need a jumper on S0 on the Gotek and no further configuration is needed.

Does the green LED on the Gotek light up at all? That light turns on when the synth is reading data from the Gotek. So if the synth is trying to boot that light should turn on.

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Yes, the Gotek has Flashfloppy installed. The ribbon cable is installed correctly, I have triple checked the orientation and pins! Everything I can find online says the same, that normally a jumper on S0 is all you need, but not this time apparently!

The LEDs on the front panel light up normally, and as I mentioned, when I connect the composite video out to a monitor, the initial splash screen displays but gets no further.

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Well. I think I’ve figured out the problem! The seller neglected to mention his amateur foray into soldering! It wasn’t obvious until I started disassembly by removing the main board and flipped it over to examine the underside. HOLY FRIGGIN MOLY!

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Ok. Replaced the entire main board with one I found on Reverb, and unit came to life!

But this revealed the guy who sold it failed to disclose several panel buttons and 3 keys on the keyboard do not work. I can fix those!

Probabky be placing an order for a contact strip and 40 tactile buttons to Syntaur parts!

But for now I am marking this as SOLVED!

*CAUTIONARY Lesson learned : Don’t trust what the seller tells you, if there is an unusual problem, check the boards early!

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